


your head looks good on my shoulder

by NoContractTermination



Category: NCT (Band), SM Rookies
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Cat/Human Hybrids, Catboys, Hand Jobs, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Some Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-17
Updated: 2017-03-17
Packaged: 2018-10-06 15:11:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10337392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoContractTermination/pseuds/NoContractTermination
Summary: Hansol is just a grad student trying to start his PhD dissertation. Taeil works in admissions and will apparently do anything for an Amazon gift card. Yuta makes brief appearances and manages to fuck everything up.





	

Hansol was stuck on Craigslist again for the third time this week. He _was_ getting paid for this— not much, but it was at least a stipend that covered rent and groceries, along with the privilege of using the lab and unlimited printing for the whole semester. Their sociology department was newly established, though, so "lab privileges" more meant access to shitty beer, generic coffee, and the lingering feeling that someone had been crying here in the past 24 hours. They didn’t even have a website up and running like the other graduate departments because the head supervisor couldn’t be assed to hire a web designer. Which was part of why Hansol was on Craigslist, shopping around for study participants rather than appealing to a stingy school board that barely even considered them official.

"'The compensation is coming directly out of my paycheck, so don’t apply for this unless you’re serious,'" Yuta read out loud from Hansol’s laptop screen and snorted. "You don’t think that’s going to drive people away?"

"It’s not really a documented study," replied Hansol. Yuta hung around here way too much for how busy his schedule should’ve been, balancing a master's and a full-time consulting job. He paid them back by restocking the food, though, so Hansol begrudgingly tolerated him. "We’re just theorizing right now. So it’s like, unofficial."

"So you’re basically putting out an advertisement for a friendly date," Yuta said, twisting back and forth in a swivel chair he stole from another cubicle.

"Only you could turn 'unofficial' into 'date' with nothing to go on, but yes it is, factoring in your broad definition of 'date'," Hansol mumbled, painstakingly typing in his schedule hunt-and-peck style because the default formatting was weird.

Yuta shrugged and pointed at Hansol’s screen. "Isn’t putting the specific qualification that they have to have ears, like, a sex thing now?"

Hansol sighed. "Yuta, this is science."

"Science is trendy!" Yuta shot back defensively. 

"The science of _sex_ is trendy," Hansol corrected, and Yuta waggled his eyebrows.

"Good thing that’s what you’re studying, then," he said, and, well, he wasn’t wrong. 

Yes, Hansol was studying more or less the sociology of sex. Yes, his bachelor’s had been in gender and sexuality studies, which led him into a short master’s stint that became the road to a PhD program after his advising professor suggested he enter an emerging field in hybrid genetics. 

It wasn’t personal or emotionally meaningful, but it was, as Yuta put it, ’trendy’, and it paid the bills. There were people out there deriving high level calculus formulas in lonely, clinical cubicles and enjoying every moment of it, so. Eight years in how hybrid body parts responded to sexual stimulation didn’t sound so bad. He was also being kicked out of his housing situation at the time, and there were open positions to TA some of the introductory humanities courses for social science majors, so he took the bait.

And here they were, two years later, with Hansol broaching research for his dissertation and Yuta making it sound like he was constructing an online dating profile. 

"We don’t have to be _compatible_ , I’m just looking for someone to interview for like 45 minutes," Hansol said.

"Then why are you literally revealing your entire personality in this Craigslist ad?" said Yuta.

"What? Show me where I did that," Hansol snapped, and Yuta frowned.

"You add way too much voice in this whole thing," Yuta said. He scanned the document again and laughed to himself— he did that a lot, though, finding Hansol’s struggle with even the smallest things infinitely amusing. Hansol, in all his awkward loneliness, was entertaining, and Yuta restocked the department fridge. They had a pretty good thing going. "You write in full sentences like a journal entry or something. Honestly, you could just make a bulleted list of prereqs and go. People will do anything for Amazon gift cards."

Hansol frowned. Yuta was a business grad and a successful consultant with a perceptive mind and way too much latent knowledge in psychoanalysis. Maybe that was why he was so effortlessly good at what he did. Meanwhile Hansol was here making ends meet on Craigslist, soliciting even basic necessities like human interaction through the magic of the Internet. "I wanted to make it more personable, you know," Hansol said dejectedly. "I don’t want them to think I’m coming in with needles and test tubes. The human genetics department label already sounds really intimidating."

"I’m not saying your voice is a _bad_ thing," Yuta mused, tipping his head back to catch the last drops of coffee from Hansol’s mug, which read _My parents are paying for my humanities degree_. "I’m just saying you might end up with, you know, more than just a test subject."

"They’re not a test subject," Hansol said firmly, and Yuta waved him off.

"I know, I know," said Yuta. "Just don’t come running to me when you end up there and find yourself a kitty friend."

—

No one responded to the ad for a good few hours, and Hansol was starting to get worried. Yuta made it sound so vile, which was not what Hansol was looking for. Okay, it was exactly what he was looking for, but not for that reason. Putting himself out in the open like this usually made him resort back to old compulsive habits like checking his email every thirty seconds, and none of the grading he’d been putting off for days was getting done. Not to mention he had to moderate a seminar with a bunch of undergrads in a few hours, and in this state, he’d walk in looking like an anxious mess— which was essentially what he was, but most of the time he was able to keep it contained under a carefully curated cool exterior. Unfortunately, undergrads had a way of taking every opening you gave them and twisting it against you until you started resembling a petulant parent and resorting to the old "because _I said so_ ".

Hansol had the interview questions drafted about a week ago, and he’d been putting off searching for participants until the last possible moment. It probably wasn’t one of his smarter decisions, in retrospect. When he put his mind to it, he could get shit done. The shit he didn’t want to do just happened to be put off for way longer because he ended up so absorbed in some other shit. 

It was good he wouldn’t be dealing with the actual science portion of this ongoing study, because if he had to actually interact with these people while prodding their bodies for live tissue samples, he probably would’ve combusted. And this was why he was in research and not clinical psychology. No, Hansol’s dissertation would merely be the basis of a hypothesis that future students would test and build on, in the grand scheme of genetic hybridity sex science. 

_Genetic hybridity_ was just the term thrown around their field. Normal people called it _Seimei’s curse_ after an ancient Japanese novelist in the late 13th century, who was found to have written the first recorded (or portrayed) instance of it in an otherwise realistic setting. 

It wasn’t that no one believed it happened, it was that no one really cared enough to get angry about it like they did with other things like race and biological sex. Maybe because it was something you could control, or maybe there was something just so _cute_ about it that made it more like being double-jointed or having hair on your fingers or being able to fold your tongue into a clover. You could go your whole life being blissfully unaware the syndrome existed at no real cost to you or anyone you knew. And if you had it yourself, it was just as easy to forget about it completely until someone brought it up as a silly bar trick or a lesson on Punnett squares. Whether that ignorance lasted a few minutes or a few years didn’t make much of a difference. 

An estimated 10% of the population displayed traits, and up to 35% were carriers. These statistics were mostly based on conjecture because social norms dictated not showing them in public and people weren't really privvy to talking about it. Genetics usually nailed rates of occurrence, though, so there was no reason to doubt the estimate. They'd been around since the beginning of time. Some people had cat ears and tails, and some people didn't. And miraculously, no one gave a shit. If only everything else in life could be that simple.

Hansol’s phone went off in the middle of class. 

The seminars were mostly just him leading the students in inane, repetitive discussion, but it was still embarrassing to have to take the call because he’d given his department extension on the Craigslist ad, and the call was coming from a local number.

It was curious the person had called him instead of emailing first. Not that the topic was too sensitive or controversial to talk about. It was only as sensitive as you got embarrassed, and embarrassment, after that party in undergrad where Hansol made out with Yuta’s friend Ten in front of a room full of their drunk labmates, was as foggy as distant memory. But though Hansol was the one soliciting the call, he wasn’t the one _really_ putting himself out there. He had to remind himself of this. "Hello?" Hansol said awkwardly, remembering a second too late that he should’ve introduced himself.

"… Is this Hansol?" someone said from the other end.

"Yes, sorry," said Hansol quickly. When was the last time he willingly answered a phone call without expecting it first? "This is Ji Hansol from the sociology and genetics department. Were you calling about the interview?"

"Oh, yes," the person replied, sounding a little relieved. "I just wanted to call to make sure you were a real person."

Hansol laughed. "Yeah, the ad is real. Our sociology section doesn’t have a website up yet, but you can check with the genetics department for credentials."

"No, I believe you," the person responded lightly, with hints of a smile on his tongue. "It’s a mighty smart profile for someone just…" he continued, trailing off. "You know, with the whole…"

"Yeah," Hansol said, deciding to save the person. If anything, Seimei’s Curse picking up traction in the realm of _sex_ of all places was what gave Hansol a job, so he owed it due respect. It was surprisingly wholesome, thrown around the yoga-practicing vegan crowd who loved trying new things. Online sex stores even sold strikingly rendered accessories to wear if you were into that. Of course, they were fake, there were no nerves, no special sensitivities, so it wasn’t quite the same. Which was what Hansol was supposed to be studying. The content of the advertisement he put out sounded kinky, but the style looked legit. It was far too specific and scholarly for someone looking for a quick fuck, the caller was trying to say. Hansol swelled with a bit of saved dignity; at least his online persona still screamed _nerd_ , which was way better than _fetishistic pervert_.

"I’m Taeil by the way. Moon Taeil," Taeil said. "I, um, have the Seimei’s Curse, if that’s what you were referring to by the—"

"No, yeah," Hansol cut in, rubbing his forehead. "Sorry about the weird wording, I was a little drunk when writing that. It was the only way I was ever going to get it out there."

Taeil laughed, the sound of his voice relaxed over the line. It was fluid, like syrup melting on a warm day. "I understand," he said. "Words are hard." 

Hansol grunted in acknowledgement and there was a comfortable silence between them for a moment. 

"Um, can we talk in person? I’m actually not very good at all over the phone," Taeil said finally, sounding meek.

"Yeah, no, same here," Hansol replied, feeling his shoulders go down a little. "When’s a good time and place? I put my schedule up in the ad, I think."

It turned out Taeil worked at the university, so they agreed to meet at the Off-Off Campus cafe two days from then, which was a quaint little dining area reserved for staff, professors, and grad students on the 4th floor of advising. Tradition had it undergrads had to be invited by staff members to even breach the doorway. When Hansol hung up, he felt surprisingly steady, missing that big _whoosh_ of breath he usually let out after he got off the phone with people. Taeil seemed comfortable and patient, so maybe this wouldn’t turn out so bad after all. Yuta would be proud. 

So Hansol thereby confided in Yuta another horrible decision not to read over the questions before the interview, instead opting to suspend the feeling that this wouldn’t be an entirely awkward and uncomfortable experience for as long as possible. 

"That is a horrible idea," Yuta, equally as tipsy as Hansol that evening, said. Hansol had spent the rest of his day filing and calculating department finances, procrastinating work with more work. "I thought you were supposed to be smart, mister PhD."

"'PhD student' doesn't necessarily equal 'makes good decisions'," Hansol said breezily. He played with the frog-shaped bottle opener Yuta gave him a few years back and contemplated the unlikely miracle that he was at least outwardly faring better than his cohorts, who regularly pulled all-nighters at the lab and stunk up the place with the smell of tears. "In fact, I'd say it's the complete opposite."

"You have a point," Yuta said, leaning back on his elbows. "Just from the fact that you willingly chose another eight years of education over financial stability and freedom."

"Maybe in your field," retorted Hansol, and Yuta laughed and swung his feet onto Hansol's coffee table. "And with your level of high functioning genius."

"Please, praise me more," Yuta said, and Hansol snorted as they calmed down to silence, which gave them room to return to contemplating Hansol's impending demise. "You just need to worry less, you know."

"You’re a fucking idiot," Hansol replied. 

Yuta rolled his eyes. "I mean, just not so much that it fucks up your entire life. Like you spend so much time worrying about how shit’s gonna turn out that you could be spending taking measures to make sure it turns out okay."

"That sounds way too functional for me," Hansol said, and Yuta smacked his arm.

"No, but you really should try to get to know the guy a little if you're not gonna look at the questions," Yuta pointed out. "It’s gonna be awkward either way. You can either play it off like you’re friendly, or go complete robot."

"Which is the worse of two evils, I wonder," mumbled Hansol.

Yuta patted his head like a condescending older sibling, except Hansol had a good year or so on Yuta. "Come on, he seems nice," said Yuta. "Taeil, you said? Give him your personal number so you guys can text. Here, I'll do it for you."

Yuta snatched Hansol's phone without much struggle because after years of friendship with Yuta, Hansol knew better than to try to beat his reflexes or to change his mind when he was set on doing something he thought would be helpful. So when Yuta finally left after polishing off Hansol’s last bag of dry kids' cereal, Hansol sunk his chest onto the coffee table to three unread notifications. 

From: [###.###.####]  
To: Hansol  
10:54PM: That’s a wonderful idea. tell yuta thanks!

From: [###.###.####]  
To: Hansol  
11:01PM: see you soon!

From: [###.###.####]  
To: Hansol  
11:14PM: And have a good night

—

One of Hansol’s various coping methods was to drown himself in work to avoid thinking about other, more unpleasant work. If work weren’t an abstract concept, it would be liquid, like alcohol. It would feel warm and sticky at first and then kill you with sweet suffocation. It would be almost unbearably painful until you stopped feeling and welcomed the weightless embrace of death. 

Oh, Hansol was doing just dandy. That was why he showed up almost late in a dark sweater-vest and wrinkled khakis to the Off-Off, hiding the hollows under his eyes with thick, lensless designer frames that Yuta gifted him for his birthday two years ago and had been collecting dust in his desk drawer until today. For some reason, he felt compelled to look presentable even though he knew Taeil worked for the university. Then again, Hansol couldn’t remember the last time he interacted with anyone other than his colleagues in the lab and occasionally his advising professor. So maybe it was the shock of it all that filled him with an unscalable rush of embarrassment as soon as he walked into the cafe and had no idea who he was looking for.

Hansol was tall but that didn’t change the fact that he looked a little young to be a few years into a PhD program. Under sloppy attire, he felt distinctly out of place, almost like he was a freshman in undergrad again, looking for a niche in this great, vast world. He buried his face in his phone and let his fringe fall over his eyes.

To: Taeil  
From: Hansol  
3:32PM: I forgot to ask… what are you wearing?

To: Hansol  
From: Taeil  
3:35PM: oh sorry! I am sitting in the back by the wall. in a dark blue sweater.

Dark blue sweater was almost half the cafe, but at least it wasn’t a cotton-blue button-down with vertical stripes, which was the other half. Hansol leaned against the display refrigerator, trying to look casual. The buzz from his phone indicated that it wasn’t working.

To: Hansol  
From: Taeil  
3:36PM: are you the tall person looking around..by any chance?

To: Taeil  
From: Hansol  
3:36PM: Maybe

A jingly laugh rang from one of the back tables, and Hansol’s head snapped up, his gaze honing in on a boy— or, young man in a (navy blue) oversized pullover who was glancing amusedly between his phone and Hansol. Hansol offered a tired smile and shuffled over, losing confidence in himself the closer he got to Taeil, whose face was smooth and creamy and yielding. His eyes were bright as he looked up at Hansol, and even while sitting Hansol had a few inches on Taeil, who looked like some weird mix of usually exclusive dichotomies. It was like he was both young and old at the same time— both naive and wise, both innocent and mischievous. It was hard to place an age or any other identifier on him because as soon as Hansol arrived at one conclusion, something about Taeil seemed to steer him astray.

"So," said Hansol after staring for a socially unacceptable length of time. "This is you."

"This is me," replied Taeil with his lips stretched into a grin. He seemed to hesitate after coming down from his amusement and remembering the contents of their interview. Which were, for the most part, highly personal and definitely not suited for introductions, but that was why Hansol had solicited to Taeil through Craigslist and they both had an overarching understanding of the situation.

Not that it made things any easier. Hansol avoided thinking about the specifics until now by compartmentalizing his dissertation topic into a hypothetical file cabinet in his brain and conveniently misplacing the key instead of wearing himself down by imagining all the ways this could go horribly wrong. Now, as he dug it out and blew the dust off, he was reaping the consequences. 

"I have a questionnaire," Hansol offered awkwardly, digging a clipboard from his bag. "If you want to fill it out, or I could ask you the questions?"

Taeil hummed, thinking. "Let’s talk," he decided and stretched his hands out across the table. "Would you like anything first, though? Coffee, maybe?"

Hansol started. "Oh, sorry— I should be treating you," he said, eyeing the cup in front of Taeil. "I’m a mess today."

"Nonsense," Taeil said, waving him off. He gave Hansol a once over that made Hansol stiffen, but he’d heard more or less that his inner emotional turmoil never quite made it to the outside world, so he ended up just staring at Taeil back. "You look fine," Taeil finished, nodding. "Smart. Handsome. Hardworking."

Every compliment Taeil spewed felt like a shot in the chest, so Hansol ended up leaving the form with Taeil while he shuffled away and waited in line to be served. Hansol couldn’t help but steal reluctant glances back at Taeil anyway, though; there was a lot to look at in a small volume of space, from his pink lips to his habit of biting them whenever he hesitated on a question. Hansol probably only succeeded in the social sciences because of his inborn patience and subconscious tendency to observe. Taeil sat with his legs crossed and his upper back against the chair, shoulders hunched over relaxedly. He seemed like a person who wouldn’t naturally offer information about himself, not out of shame but rather by pattern of defaulting to his quiet personality. He seemed comfortable and without pretenses, which was all Hansol really could’ve asked for from the demographic he was canvassing. 

"I finished all the short questions," Taeil said a little sheepishly as he handed the clipboard back to Hansol. Hansol nodded and watched Taeil’s face, glancing between his eyes and his hair, which was fluffy and hid wherever his ears would’ve protruded. Not that Hansol was expecting to be able to tell anyway that Taeil had the Seimei’s Curse without knowing beforehand. It was said that one in ten people displayed symptoms, but Hansol couldn’t recall anything ever being noticeable from the thousands of people he’d interacted with in his lifetime. It suddenly occurred to Hansol that Taeil could be faking it, but he didn’t seem like the type. Hansol noted in the corner of the page to check in on it anyway at the end of the interview. 

Notable responses were that Taeil was slightly older than Hansol, openly gay, and his favorite pastimes were singing, listening to music, and preparing food for the semiannual admission staff potluck. Hansol read that out loud, and Taeil smiled a little to himself. "It’s coming up soon and it was all I could think of," he explained.

Hansol smiled gently. "No, it’s perfect." After glancing around and brushing his hair out of his face, Hansol said, "Do you want to talk in my office?"

Taeil shook his head. "I figured here was better since it’s… I mean here, there’s background noise."

"True," said Hansol, crossing his legs and leaning back. Backgrounds made things seem less permanent. Taeil was hunched over the table again and attentive, looking up at Hansol, who continued, "What are you planning to do with the gift card?"

Taeil laughed. "Maybe buy a birthday gift for my mother, I don’t know."

"Mm, how are you going to explain where you got the money from?" said Hansol.

Taeil’s mouth curved into a smile. "This is for science, right?" The lilt in his voice was both unmistakable and a little shy, as if he lost his confidence mid-sentence but was determined to go through with it anyway. Hansol hummed noncommittally because Taeil seemed to be waiting for a reply, and Taeil laughed. "I have a salary, Hansol."

Hansol sniffed awkwardly. He’d definitely been going somewhere with this but he forgot as soon as Taeil gave that cheeky reply that edged on flirty, turning the tables on him. It was like friendly word banter without commitments. "In seriousness, if there’s anything you don’t feel like answering, just say 'pass'. You don’t have to say why."

"Sounds fair," said Taeil. 

Taeil seemed about as comfortable as expected talking about his ears. His body language, for which natural discomfort discussing personal topics had to be accounted, still felt too candid to be sustaining a long-term lie. Hansol watched Taeil’s movements the entire time while jotting down the actual content of his conversation— that he’d noticed them when he was five or six, that he most of the time retracted them for long periods of time and forgot they were there until someone brought it up, that they were gray like a Russian Blue cat. 

"It’s not just ears, by the way," Taeil said, playing with the end of his teabag. He looked away then, like he was only now feeling embarrassed. "There’s a tail too."

Hansol couldn’t help his head from shooting up to look at Taeil’s face, and Taeil immediately flushed when Hansol stared. "Really?"

Taeil nodded. "But I can control them separately, so. I just… thought I’d add that since it seemed relevant." 

"It is," said Hansol, trying to keep his voice as neutral as possible. 

The topic was sex. There was really no sugarcoating it. And Hansol had tried, thousands of times, in thousands of different scenarios reenacted both in real life and in his head. They all ended similarly poorly. Hansol at least made it clear in the application that his dissertation was attempting to associate the known sensitivity of hybrid features with its effect on hormones, libido, and sexual behavior, and to further postulate the implications that would have on how people broached the topic of Seimei’s Curse in conventional society. The mouthful translated to layman’s terms was basically whether or not hybridity had an effect on sex and how that would affect people. The genetics team would have to take care of the biological research; Hansol oversaw the theoretical side. Of course, it made for some incredibly awkward questions, and he didn’t just have friends he could ask about it. 

"The tail is more… sensitive, if that’s what you’re wondering," Taeil said, rubbing the back of his head. The ends of his sleeves dangled over his palms cutely. "Sensitive to stimulation."

"Are your ears not?" asked Hansol.

"Not to my own hands, no," Taeil replied.

"And have you tried with other people?"

Taeil huffed and made an amused kind of expression, twisting his mouth. "No," he said, glancing at Hansol for a moment then averting his gaze.

"That’s fine," Hansol said quickly, noting the past couple answers in shorthand. 

"… Do you have to look at me like that?" Taeil said while watching Hansol write. Taeil then opened his mouth to add something but decided against it.

Hansol had heard enough times that his bulging eyes made him resemble a frog to know exactly what Taeil was referring to. On top of that, Hansol had long since perfected his technique of writing without looking at the paper, leaving his eyes free to wander. "I— I tend to pick up more through body language," Hansol explained. "It’s kinda become a habit now. I’m sorry."

"Oh, no," said Taeil after a moment. "It’s just— ah, it’s nothing."

"Don’t worry, that’s just, like, between us," Hansol added. "I’m not writing it down or anything, and I can’t quote things you don’t explicitly say."

"Comforting," Taeil replied with a nip of sarcasm, dipping his head down to sip his tea.

"We’re almost done, promise," said Hansol. His phone lit up, indicating the time. They barely got through half of the questions, and Taeil tilted his head accordingly.

"That seemed short."

"Yeah, I’m notoriously bad at estimating how long things will take," Hansol said, and Taeil laughed.

"You know, if you want to meet again, I— I’d be happy to," Taeil said. "I mean, if that’s in accordance to protocol and all."

Hansol frowned. "You sure?"

"Positive." Taeil wrapped his hands around his empty cup. "I don’t have anywhere to be, anyway. We end early on Fridays."

Regrettably, Hansol had scheduled time at the lab before going out to the bar with some old friends from undergrad. "Thanks," Hansol said awkwardly, then added, "I mean it, really. It—it means a lot to me." Taeil’s smile looked like about the best reply ever. As he was packing up, Hansol noticed the note he’d written earlier in the corner of his questionnaire. He froze.

Taeil sensed this immediately. "You okay?" he said.

Hansol had gotten through worse than this before. He just had to get the question out there for authentication purposes; Taeil’s response was beyond his control. Again, not that Taeil seemed like the type to lie, but it would bother Hansol’s procedural side for ages if he let Taeil go without some measure of proof but asked for it from everyone else he interviewed. 

Awkwardness was unavoidable. Hansol had done all he could to accept this since deciding that he’d be interviewing for his initial research stage. But this felt like something else, bordering on intimacy. Maybe because he had played it familiar with Taeil, part of which he could blame on Yuta and his frightening ability to detect when things were going to pile up and become more than Hansol could handle. It was like Yuta somehow predicted Hansol would fall in love. Notwithstanding labels and Hansol’s established bisexuality, though it wasn’t something he made public information. 

Hansol partly blamed himself for being attracted to Taeil, and the other part of him— ironically, the scientific part— accepted that it was something he couldn’t have helped. Half of him proposed that not being sexually attracted to someone for years set him up for imminent failure, while the other half cited it as proof that he wasn’t purposely trying to sabotage his own research. Taeil made him all contradictory like that and all jumbled up inside. He felt not like a tired, jaded graduate student but a hormonal teenager with a sudden, nostalgic burst of energy and passion that was too appealing to just let go of. Taeil made him like that for the first time in a while, and to hell with research— there would be other opportunities, other applicants, and other methodologies. Right now, Hansol wanted Taeil and all the rollercoasters and first times and sparks down his spine and under his skin that Taeil brought with him. 

"I realize I forgot to do this earlier, but," Hansol started, running his hand through his hair awkwardly. It was starting to become a nervous habit. Taeil watched him. "Can I… well, not that I suspect or mean to imply that you’re lying, but it’s just standard procedure—"

"You want to see them?" Taeil said, his shoulders dropping naturally. He smiled. "Oh, you’re just worked up about that?"

"Sorry," said Hansol, flustered, and Taeil touched his forearm lightly.

"You don’t have to apologize so much," he said. "It’s fine. Just… not here?"

"Right," said Hansol. "We can go to my lab— or, office. It’s the same thing. No one’s there."

As they made their way across the quad, Taeil’s hand brushed against Hansol’s in his effort to keep up with Hansol’s brisk pace in the late autumn weather. Undergrads scuttled around them with their families, and a few boys were tossing around a frisbee. "Hard to believe you screened all these people," Hansol said.

Taeil laughed. "Yeah, it’s not a fancy job like yours, but it’s rewarding— sometimes."

"Oh, being a grad student is a lot more paperwork than anything else," Hansol said, stuffing his hand in his pocket but leaving the other out, feeling it almost migrate toward Taeil on its own, like he wanted Taeil to hang onto his pinky. 

"Paperwork about sex is interesting, isn’t it?" Taeil said, and Hansol could hear the grin in his voice. 

Hansol hummed. "You know when something becomes your job and that ruins it?"

"Oh _no_ ," Taeil said, and Hansol laughed into the air as Taeil scurried up to his side.

"I’m kidding, it’s not that bad."

"You still enjoy having sex then?" Taeil said, sounding genuinely concerned, and Hansol looked down at him momentarily, which was probably not a great decision. 

If you googled Seimei’s Curse, you could get the main gist of what people with it looked like. It wasn’t quite as taboo as googling porn, but it wasn’t something you wanted to be caught doing at work, unless you were, well, Ji Hansol. Imagining what the ears looked like on Taeil wasn’t difficult; it was actually how automatically Hansol’s brain conjured up the image that caught him off-guard. Taeil looked up at him guilelessly, and there was something about the twinkle in his eyes that framed so effortlessly the outline of ears tucked into his hair. 

"Y-yeah," Hansol said, after he’d definitely been staring too long that the pause was noticeable. If Taeil caught on, though, he didn’t say anything. He seemed satisfied with Hansol’s response.

"That’s good," Taeil said, resorting to half-skipping beside Hansol. "It’s one of life’s simple pleasures."

Hansol coughed and buried the bottom half of his face in his scarf. 

Undergrad made for some weirdass times with weirdass kinds of people you didn’t even know existed. Not just students either: RAs, advisors, professors. That was the magic of college: discovering possibilities in spaces you didn’t even know to look in before. Hansol thought undergrad had desensitized him to sex talk, and if it were anyone else, he wouldn’t have even a hint of a reaction. Not that Taeil was Hansol’s type— hell, Hansol didn’t even have a specific type. Taeil might’ve been it if Hansol thought long and hard about it, but so used to being absorbed in the intricacies of others was Hansol that he rarely found time to reflect back in on himself. There was no urgency to relationships; it was one of the few things he could leave up to the stars and hope they brought someone back down to him. Maybe this was some weird consequence of it then: having everything align so that Hansol, when conducting an interview to start research on his dissertation, became helplessly attracted to not just any subject of that dissertation, but someone Hansol could wrap his hands around and pet and touch, all things he never knew he took a liking to. But life was weird, which was something you came to accept with age. And not all the weird was bad, which was something that took even _longer_ to realize. Hansol figured he was just getting to the basics of it now.

"We’re here," he announced to no one, purposely entering through a back door into the stairwell because an elevator ride with this man was probably not going to pan out well. Taeil pressed their arms together and reached up to palm at the door as his wool peacoat almost swallowed him in its size.

"You weren’t kidding about the whole lab-office situation," Taeil said, and Hansol grunted as he unlocked his office door and drew the slatted blinds closed, a motion Taeil laughed lightly at. 

Hansol never really took a good look at the furnishings of his office; they were functional and thrown together out of necessity, but under Taeil’s scrutiny, everything felt suddenly incredibly generic. Taeil seemed interested in the books, which were titled obnoxiously _Gender, Sexuality, and Intimacy_ or _Sex Acts_ or something along those lines. Even academics, it seemed, were not immune to the subtle workings of clickbait rhetoric. When Taeil noticed Hansol watching him, he smiled tentatively.

"Close your eyes," he said. Hansol snorted despite himself, and Taeil smacked his hand lightly. Taeil’s touch was fire on Hansol’s cold skin. "Come on, it’s like watching a person undress."

"Fair enough," Hansol breathed, and Taeil’s laugh sounded even merrier when it was the only sound in the room. When Taeil touched Hansol’s hand again, Hansol jumped lightly, stiff as he was.

"Okay, whenever you’re ready," Taeil said after a moment, and Hansol squinted as he blinked his eyes open, not really sure what he was preparing himself for.

Whatever it was, he was definitely not prepared enough. Taeil was leaning back against the front edge of Hansol’s mahogany desk with the backs of his thighs propped right up against the molding. His ears twitched when Hansol finally looked up at them as if they could feel the weight of his awe and the itch of his sudden urge to _touch_. Taeil brought his tail around his body and flicked it toward Hansol playfully, and Hansol choked on his breath. 

"So?" Taeil said, his posture straightening up at Hansol’s reaction which must’ve shown on his face. Not that he did anything to hide it, and with only two of them in the room, there wasn’t much else to focus on besides Hansol’s wide eyes tracing the edges of Taeil’s ears. 

"Can I… ?" Hansol mumbled vaguely, his hand twitching by his side. He wasn’t really thinking before he let that slip out of his mouth, the implications of it pretty obvious. There was no reason he needed to touch them for research. He was pretty sure Taeil knew this by now. It was out of pure indulgence and completely impulsive in the heat of the moment. Hansol’s heart leapt into his throat for a split second as he waited for Taeil’s reply. This was where the pretenses dissolved.

"Mm," Taeil said, pushing off the desk and stepping toward Hansol. Hansol reached up slowly like if he moved too fast Taeil would disappear, but Taeil waited for him. There was no urgency in relationships. The back of Hansol’s fingers brushed the tip of Taeil’s ear, and Taeil had no notable reaction at first, only staring up at Hansol challengingly. So Hansol continued his motion down the back of Taeil’s ear and into where it met his hair, rubbing slowly at the baby-soft fur and marveling how the whole integrity of the ear’s structure gave way under pressure. 

And then Taeil _purred_.

Even Taeil didn’t seem aware of the sound he just made until a light flush spread across his cheeks and his eyes, closed in response to the physical sensations, snapped open. "Oh my god."

Hansol would’ve said something along those lines, but his voice was lost somewhere in his throat.

Taeil must’ve taken the falter in Hansol’s reaction the wrong way, though, because then his movements became awkward as he looked at Hansol. His eyes darted around, gauging Hansol hesitantly like he was suddenly ripped from a dream. 

Hansol couldn’t let Taeil slip away because he was too fucking turned on to say anything constructive. "Taeil," Hansol said (which still wasn’t constructive), stepping forward and brushing Taeil’s fringe to the side of his face. Taeil was still cautious, but he didn’t back away.

Some otherworldly force stopped Hansol as he was leaning down a fraction of an inch before he kissed Taeil. Maybe, again, out of inborn patience or instinctive respect, Hansol opened his eyes and searched for signs of resistance on Taeil’s face. Taeil’s mouth hung open and his eyes were closed like he was waiting for Hansol.

"Can I?" Hansol repeated, and Taeil shuddered at the breath across his lips.

"Please," he murmured.

Hansol didn’t know how he’d been expecting this to work. Maybe because he never hooked up with anyone he didn’t know intimately before. Asking to touch Taeil’s ears in retrospect probably felt to Taeil a lot more intimate than a kiss, but Taeil hadn’t said anything of it. Then again, maybe there wasn’t a set "way" hookups were supposed to work. This seemed to be the stance Taeil was acting on. The ball was rolling, and Hansol was trapped underneath it. 

Hansol mouthed at the seam between Taeil’s lips, and Taeil opened up and twisted their tongues together, wrapping his arms around Hansol’s neck. Taeil felt warm, almost feverish, in Hansol’s arms. "Are you okay?" Hansol breathed against Taeil’s lips, cut off by Taeil kissing him over and over, nipping at every inch of his lips and the corner of his mouth slow and insistent, dragging the skin between his own lips and nursing it. It was incredibly sensual, like a slow dance.

"It gets like that at first," Taeil replied, nosing the line of Hansol’s jaw. "It’ll go away if we— if we continue."

Hansol smiled and pressed kisses down the line of Taeil’s neck, and Taeil tilted his head to give Hansol more room. "I’d like that," he said into the juncture of Taeil’s neck and shoulder, and Taeil shivered.

"Me too," Taeil said. He trailed off into a whine when Hansol’s other hand, which had been resting against the back of Taeil’s head passively, snaked up and rubbed against the back of his ear again. 

"Thought you said it wasn’t sensitive," Hansol mumbled, and Taeil arched into him and keened against Hansol’s touch.

"Haven’t tried with other people before," Taeil replied and muffled his voice against Hansol’s neck, biting into it lightly when Hansol traced the edge of his ear with his thumb. Hansol choked out a groan and his hand scrabbled at the back of Taeil’s shirt, clutching whatever he could reach.

Taeil was pushing him, backing him into an old loveseat propped between two overflowing bookshelves. Hansol’s knees buckled and he sat down ungracefully as Taeil landed on top of him, splayed out across his thighs with his hands on Hansol’s chest. Hansol wound his arms around Taeil and gripped his back, snaking his hands underneath Taeil’s shirt and making him gasp and arch away from the chill. 

And as if to get back at him, Taeil twisted his hips forward and down right up against the obvious tent in Hansol’s slacks and they moaned in tandem, Hansol’s hands digging into Taeil’s waist. Taeil’s back was stretched taut like a board but his stomach yielded to Hansol’s thumbs, and Hansol rubbed circles all the way down to Taeil’s hips, jutting out of his loose jeans.

Taeil, squirming as if he didn’t know which way to lean, seemed to enjoy the attention. He made quick work of the buttons and zippers in their pants as Hansol played with his ears absently, concentrating on holding out for as long as possible with Taeil panting in his lap and shoving his hand down Hansol’s pants. Taeil’s fingers felt both clumsy and nimble, shaking but firm, when he traced Hansol’s dick and Hansol jerked up instinctively, smiling sheepish when Taeil giggled at his reaction. 

Hansol felt frozen stupid as he watched Taeil wriggle in his lap, unintentionally rubbing against Hansol as he tried to push both their pants down at once and only succeeded in shoving their crotches against each other. He hissed under his breath; bumbling and frantic in Hansol's arms, Taeil somehow became even more beautiful as he unraveled himself little by little. 

And then their dicks were touching, and Hansol came to, mumbling, " _Shit_ ," as Taeil grinned against the corner of his mouth.

"I’ll make it quick," Taeil said cheekily, which was evidently a challenge. So Hansol kissed back and dragged his hands down Taeil’s back and inside his pants, cupping his ass and bringing him closer. He kneaded Taeil’s ass gently and Taeil rocked forward in his hands, burying his face into the crook of Hansol’s neck with heavy breaths on his tongue. He stroked their dicks together slowly despite his earlier promise, and Hansol groaned, half impatient as hell to finally come and half dreading when it would have to be over. 

When Hansol opened his eyes briefly to watch Taeil’s expression, he found Taeil's tail flicking in front of his face like an invitation. With Taeil’s sweater hiked up to his middle, his back was laid out for Hansol, curved and smooth right down to the base of his tail where it met his skin, and his pants, unbuttoned, slipped down around his thighs. Hansol kissed the corner of Taeil’s jaw reassuringly before bringing one hand back up and giving Taeil’s tail a long, gentle stroke from base to tip.

Taeil keened, and the noise he let out was the most desperate, indecent moan Hansol had ever heard. Precome dripped down Taeil’s hand and Hansol’s dick, and Hansol quickly went back to it, playing with the base of Taeil’s tail and thumbing the ridges in his spine that laid a trail right out to it.

Taeil was falling apart. His breaths were quick and heaving, clipped by a whine or a drawn-out moan that broke his rhythm, and his hand went slack as he jerked them off sloppily. Hansol didn’t mind; rather, the thought that he could make Taeil like this so easily was more arousing than a handjob. Just under the base of Taeil’s tail was his entrance, which was hard not to attend to with Taeil arching his back like that, holding himself up on his knees as he bucked in Hansol’s lap. Hansol brought his other hand up and circled the rim with his middle finger while the rest of his hand still cupped Taeil’s ass hungrily.

" _Hansol_ —!" Taeil yelped, and when Hansol pushed the tip of his finger inside, Taeil screamed and came, his ears flattening against his hair and his tail cracking taut like a whip.

It took Taeil a little while to come down from his high, panting and slumping against Hansol, and Hansol watched the whole time with something warm like affection swirled under all that arousal at the sight of Taeil’s come stark against his dark blue sweater. Taeil glanced up at Hansol smiled, bringing his hand up to his mouth and licking his fingers coquettishly. Even though Taeil only humored him with quick, unsatisfying glimpses of his tongue, it was enough to make Hansol groan and slap Taeil’s hand away and replace it with his mouth. His tongue dove between Taeil’s pliant lips and Taeil accepted him eagerly, getting right back to jerking Hansol off with a laugh.

If Hansol closed his eyes, he could imagine thrusting deep into Taeil while Taeil’s hand provided the friction. Taeil would be warm, _hot_ beneath him, face down on his knees and clawing at the bedsheets, muffling lewd noises into the pillow. Hansol groaned loud and came to this image, choking out Taeil’s name. 

"God," Hansol grunted and fell back against the couch, and Taeil fell with him with a breathless little laugh, leaning into his chest. They were both in their mid-20s but fucked like teenagers again, in Hansol’s _office_ without even bothering to take their clothes off or lock the door. And it was so good. 

"Those plans of yours tonight," Taeil said after a while, once Hansol’s breathing evened out. He looked off to the side and traced Hansol’s arm absently. "Can they be cancelled?"

Hansol laughed and buried his nose in Taeil’s hair. "Actually, yeah," he said, and Taeil’s ear twitched against Hansol’s forehead. Taeil smelled familiar, like an old friend. There was something about sharing something intimate with the right person that made it feel like Hansol had known him longer than some of his cohorts from undergrad. There was something about Taeil, who looked quiet and reserved, opening up under his fingers. Taeil pulled his tail and ears away, and Hansol still wanted to scoop him up and take him home.

"Your place or mine?" Taeil said, though he made no motion to stand up and instead curled into Hansol’s side.

Hansol eyed the clock and snorted. "Dinner first?"

Taeil replied with a surprised but pleased noise and laced their fingers together, sweaty palms and sticky fingers. It felt good and right. Evidently Taeil still thought Hansol was partially just looking for a fuck, and had gone with it anyway. This just meant Hansol had more to prove, to take him out for a nice meal and buy him some flowers and kiss him slow on the porch. It all sounded strangely appealing. "Then it’s a date?" Taeil said, not bothering to hide his eagerness.

Hansol laughed and squeezed Taeil’s hand. "It’s a date."

—

Hansol walked Taeil to the admissions building the next day and showed up to lab early for the first time in six months after agreeing to meet again to go apple picking next weekend. There was an unspoken agreement to at least alternate between wholesome and unwholesome activities. He arrived at his office to a bottle of Chardonnay on his desk with a ribbon and fancy-looking tag.

_Impress him with some nice wine. Maybe you won’t look like such a desperate fuck then_

_\- Yuta_

_PS: I’ve voluntarily rescinded my own visitation rights goodbye forever_

**Author's Note:**

> Not sure if this was the hybrid AU you were expecting but I didn't want to make anything too angsty because I'm allergic to angst. Apparently this means I've regressed back to producing nothing but complete sin _(:3｣∠)_ The name Seimei is taken from the anime Loveless for those of you who have seen it. I'm not very creative! Thank you as always for reading and leaving comments/kudos!


End file.
